In a distribution system, a retailer or other product distributor (which may collectively be referred to as distributors) typically maintains an inventory of various items at one or more distribution centers. The inventory items are ordered from one or more vendors, received at the distribution centers as inbound shipments, and stocked in inventory of the distribution centers. In an order fulfillment process, orders for items may be received from customers of the distributor. Units of the ordered items are picked from various locations of inventory in the distribution centers, processed for shipping, and shipped as outbound shipments to the customers. A distribution network may include any number of such distribution centers in order to fulfill customer demand. In some cases, inventory items within a distribution center may be tracked by one or more identifiers, some of which are non-unique across different items.
While various embodiments are described herein by way of example for several embodiments and illustrative drawings, those skilled in the art will recognize that various embodiments are not limited to the embodiments or drawings described. It should be understood, that the drawings and detailed description thereto are not intended to limit embodiments to the particular form disclosed, but on the contrary, the intention is to cover all modifications, equivalents and alternatives falling within the spirit and scope of various embodiments as defined by the appended claims. The headings used herein are for organizational purposes only and are not meant to be used to limit the scope of the description or the claims. As used throughout this application, the word “may” is used in a permissive sense (i.e., meaning having the potential to), rather than the mandatory sense (i.e., meaning must). Similarly, the words “include,” “including,” and “includes” mean including, but not limited to.